Album Reviews |

The Cure



Three Imaginary Boys 6½ ( 1979 )
10.15 Saturday Night / Accuracy / Grinding Halt / Another Day / Object / Subway Song / Foxy Lady / Meat Hook / So What / Fire In Cairo / It's Not You / Three Imaginary Boys / The Weedy Burton

Lest we forget, they were boys, too. Formed in 1976 whilst still at school and just in time, or perhaps because of, the punk explosion. This debut LP set from 1979 clearly betrays the groups punkish origins although is already moving beyond such limited confines. The writing of one Robert Smith slows the pace down for some songs, has a more usual punk speed and style for other songs. Quite a varied set, no less! Ah, before I begin proper. In the US, this album was repackaged as 'Boys Don't Cry' substituting certain tracks here for a couple of Cure singles. It made for a more commercial, if less pure album, but I won't be discussing that particular set here. Oh no, instead i'll focus on the types of songs here I imagine Robert Smith and his Cure fellows were playing way back in 1976/1977, when mere lads. So, ah yes, 'The Weedy Burton', the kind of inconsequential one minute long track a group would play to wind down their set at an early pub gig. A cover of Jimi Hendrix 'Foxy Lady', sang here by one Michael Dempsey, the groups then bass/guitar player. And you know what? This track that replaces the original music, melody and many of the words of the Hendrix original, comes across as very light, weak punk rock. The kind of style that would have got the group absolutely nowhere had they perservered with it. Then we've got a song such as 'So What', an intriguing state of musical transition that points towards the groups immediate future, which by the way, was also contained on this LP. Indeed, the move away from covering the likes of 'Foxy Lady' and producing material such as 'So What' and 'Meat Hook' right through to the assured melodic pop/new wave style of '10.15' is the kind of progress many groups would make over a matter of years, rather than during the course of one LP. Naturally, this could have been down to the fact The Cure were writing new songs at a rate of knots. That 'Three Imaginary Boys' contains a mix of old and new Cure compositions, although of course, we aren't to know if that was a fact or is mere speculation on my part.

So, a highlight arrives dead early with the cool and slightly sinister '10.15 Saturday Night', a song whereby it's not immediately clear what is producing the actual melody. The guitar slashes, the bass creates a mood. The vocal melodies are there. Combined together you've got a slice of atmospheric and enjoyable music-making. 'Accuracy' is up next, and the bass is the key ingredient. We slow down for 'Another Day', which proved The Cure could be all subtle and mysterious. Things truly were falling into place! 'Subway Song' is pure atmosphere, quiet and everything else, then a listener is rudely awoken by the scary loud scream at the end. 'Fire In Cairo' and the title track are both quality songs, especially the latter. Very intriguing indeed is the title song, something obviously pointing a way forwards for the group. So? Well, this isn't the greatest of debut LPs and its something we'd have forgotten about long ago, were The Cure not to have gone on and had the career they actually did. Enough good moments abound to make it an album worth digging out every once in a while, though.

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Enter Simon Gallup to play bass, after Mr Dempsey apparently didn't like Robert Smith's new lyrics or songs. We've also got a keyboard player here, so The Cure become a proper four-piece of guitars/vocals, keyboards, bass and drums. Perversely, they sound much less like an actual band here than they did on their debut. Well, let me explain. They sound more focused and tighter and have certainly got better, yet where are the live sounding drums? Where are the rock and roll guitars? Well, nowhere to be seen of course. 'Seventeen Seconds' has a drum pattern that is the same throughout all the songs, yet subtly varied, sped up or slowed down, for each one. Sometimes, not even that! The bass also varies, just enough, picking out different moods. Yes, 'Seventeen Seconds' does indeed have different moods. It's also an album quite hard to actually write about. Well, i'll try my best. Robert Smith wasn't too happy with 'Three Imaginary Boys' as an actual album. So, 'Seventeen Seconds' is deliberately cohesive, to the point that yeah, all the songs seem to sound more or less the same. Yet, we've got different lyrics and different tempos and different guitar melodies and different bass patterns. Even if all the guitar parts use the same tone and all the bass guitar parts use the same tone. Ahem. Well, it's certainly interesting on a first or second listen, as the sounds merge together song after song, yet the likes of 'A Forest' or 'Play For Today' immediately jump out at you as proper, melodic pop songs.

I'll start somewhere. 'A Reflection' which is immediately quiet yet unsettling, stripped back, so simple yet effective. We have a highlight with the mighty 'Play For Today', a song which opens in a very similar fashion to 'Jumping On Someone Elses Train', a Cure single released more or less around the same time. Yet, as with all of 'Seventeen Seconds', similar yet different. It's certainly one of the more fleshed out, effective set of lyrics on an album that in a way, relies upon its lyrics. 'Secrets', with its instrumental sections and quiet vocals, appropriately so. Secrets. The slower 'In Your House' with a bass line that attracts. An experimental mid-section to the album surrounding key track, 'A Forest'. Only by the time 'At Night' arrives do you slightly wonder and worry. The title track closing this set is similarly inconclusive. Robert Smith attempting to make a full album that works, without obvious high and low, with a set mood that's varied still. It's let down by 'Seventeen Seconds' lacking a concept and lacking a particular reason to be. Still, it was a step forwards for them, a leap in sound they would subsequently come back to, and expand upon.

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Adding yet further depth, shade and texture, Robert Smith and friends move further into the territory marked 'bleak'. Yet of course, it's a bleak with shards of light raining down on you intermittantly, and its these bursts of light that we seek out in a good, balanced Cure album. Two songs less on this set than the previous 'Seventeen Seconds' which allowed Robert Smith to further refine his search for a perfect, cohesive album with no filler and his search for an album that would mean something to the listener. Mr Smith with his growing hair, his penchant for reading unsuitable books and regurgitating all of this in his increasingly oblique and intellectual lyrics. 'The Holy Hour' makes for a weighty, serious opener which is thrown into relief by the urgent bass led 'Primary'. Which in turn, is led by the slower, serious, yet still melodic fine tunery of 'Other Voices', which I happen to adore. It gets me, not sure why. It reaches inside me, I love the sound of a bass guitar in any case and Simon Gallup does a fine job with his bass-lines across the album as a whole. Hats off to Mr Gallup! A perfectly paced and constructed first half of the album is rounded off with the beautiful 'All Cats Are Grey'. We get the first of a particular kind of extended Cure song introduction, something they'd repeat in years hence, particularly with their lauded 'Disintegration' album. The vocals and lyrics for 'All Cats Are Grey' are particularly sombre in tone, yet then again? People dying in Iraq. The London bombings. News stories everyday. Those kind of events are full of sombre tones. The Cure are just painting with music and words to evoke a feeling in a listener. That 'All Cats Are Grey' contains beautiful, if minimalist music, should really be enough. That the vocals and words are used deliberately to create a certain artistic effect. That should really be enough.

Opening of side two? Why am I writing this review like this, kind of track by track? Well, partly because the album is the most perfectly sequenced and thought out of The Cure albums thus far, and it kind of demands that the order intended is the order of the album. The order is part of the album. After the quiet and beautiful 'All Cats Are Grey' comes the even happier 'The Funeral Party', yet never before had The Cure come so close to matching and reaching the desolate, fantastic beauty of Joy Division circa 'The Eternal' from their 'Closer' album. That The Cure were still continuing to progress artistically as each year passed is beyond doubt. And, just when we needed something more uptempo, up pops the enjoyable 'Doubt', almost a retreat to 'Three Imaginary Boys' territory. Still, we needed 'Doubt' to be able to enjoy 'The Drowning Man', an atmospheric entity that really does place you under murky water, reaching for the light somewhere. Light that's shining down through the blackness. The title song, as it did with 'Seventeen Seconds', arrives last of all. And, what do we have? Well, a summary of sorts of what's come before. Musically, lyrically. In terms of mood. Ghostly vocals that sound like Robert Smith probably did need to cheer up, but hey? Why change tack when you've really got yourself onto something positive artistically??

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Robert Smith goes all out here to create an album that was intended as a 'fuck you'. Who this is directed at remains unclear, but i'm not too worried. Lyrics that are consistently dark and death/murder obsessed. Listen to the magnificent opening. Could The Cure have created this without 'Closer' by Joy Division? The shadow of Joy Division hung heavy over early 80s alternative music in the UK. I don't care, 'One Hundred Years' is utterly brilliant. The regular/jerky drum pattern gets you moving and the synths are perfectly in tune, the guitar is suitably doomy. Robert spins his tales and snippets of unglory, one after the other. We get slower, 'Siamese Twins' for example repeats the drum pattern, slows it right down. The guitar lines work almost as additional moody percussion, neatly mixed with slices of beautiful, desolate, melodic phrases. It's difficult to say 'Pornography' is an album to be enjoyed, but then it was difficult to say that about either 'Faith' or 'Seventeen Seconds' either. It's clear however that the particular path Robert Smith was pursuing had reached some kind of ending with 'Pornography'. Well, perhaps not an ending, but at least an ending with a crossroads. No devil waiting, the devil was inside his own mind. It's easy to see why 'Pornography' was latched onto by hordes of similarly minded souls, the darkness is comforting when the light seems all too taunting. 'Cold', for example, could be the soundtrack to a suicidal soul and it could also be a distant relative of 'The Eternal' by Joy Division. It could also be a big Robert Smith hug for the lonely.

The first half of the album is flawless. After the stunning opening track, 'A Short Term Effect' contains genuinely sinister guitar noises and a rhythm section sounding almost funky in contrast to the guitars and the lyrics/vocals. Best known song here, 'The Hanging Garden', is the only tune that could be described as even slightly cheery and it provides variety. The drums are almost tribal, suitably enough I suppose. What kind of jungle is this after all? One where you can catch halos on the moon? The animals scream, the listener sings along. Well, some listeners do. This naturally enough isn't for everyone. The Cure apparently having abandoned populist with their debut. Since then, ploughing a path to carve out a niche. 'Pornography' cemented that niche quite spectacularly. 'The Figurehead' and 'A Strange Day'. Well, neither are weak, not at all. Just by this stage the album needed another slice of variety akin to 'The Hanging Garden'. Well, nothing is perfect in this world. Listening to the lyrics to 'Pornography' makes that quite clear. The weather-girl is smiling at you from her glossed-over face. It's sunny, but it's going to get cloudy later on in the week. What does it all mean? The title track brings the album to a close, six minutes of atmosphere. Was it all a dream? The album doesn't seem to actually mean anything, but it creates this dream/nightmare, very well indeed. Take your pick, really.

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Releasing singles as un-cure like as possible resulted in? Lots of people who had never heard of The Cure suddenly loved them! Not that Japanese Whispers, a compilation of various Cure single projects recorded in 1983, is particularly a good document, but it does and did serve a purpose. First then, some background. Simon Gallup left the group, Robert Smith spent time working with Siouxsie And The Banshees and 'Lets Go To Bed' was released as an excersize in sounding different to how they'd sounded before. It worked, it scratched away at the singles charts, as did 'The Walk'. 'The Lovecats' absolutely stormed the charts, top ten in the UK! Robert Smith suddenly had a lot of things to think about as a result of his little excersize and all was well. Well, it split the existing fan-base of course, cries of 'sell-out' usually do accompany such things, but now it's all ancient history. The Cure were revealed as more than a one-trick pony, something long-term followers of the band knew anyway. So, 'Let's Go To Bed'? What, and have sex whilst listening to 'Pornography'? Well, as slices of early 80s dance influenced pop, 'The Walk and 'Let's Go To Bed' are pretty spiffing, fun, and the things have TUNES! Speaking of tunes, the stand-up bass of 'The Lovecats' perfectly matches the image of a cat walking up and down, all slinky. As a cat-lover, i've a couple or four 'lovecats' myself in my home, but that's by the by. The song was felt as 'novelty' by Robert Smith, and indeed it is. The fact that it became so huge may have embarrassed him, but when he picked up the royalty check, perhaps he cracked a wry smile. Who knows?

Of the other songs here, we've a mixed bag. A few tunes harking back to the groups more doomy style, albeit with shinier production. A few other tunes as bed-fellows to the pop-singles? We've got 'Speak My Language' that has happy bass and mischeivous Smith lyrics and had it been designed as such, could have made a good single in its own right. 'The Upstairs Room' has very 80s synth sounds, but its another bouncy tune. Elsewhere, 'Lament' is a beautiful slice of of melancholy, 'The Dream' irritating with it's squelchingly high pitched synth noises and hideously dated 80s production. 'Just One Kiss' comes across as a 'Pornography' out-take almost. Could have been better. Ah, all in all 'Japanese Whispers' is decent enough although the least remarkable effort they'd released and the most throwaway. Yet, that's what it was always going to be given the way it was designed and put together. This release saw The Cure in a state of transition from which they'd ultimately emerge all the stronger for.

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'The Top' was always going to have a difficult job to do, balancing a walk between Cure fans old and then new. The pop Cure fans are served by a glossier production than the likes of 'Pornography', but then, many of them won't have heard that album, anyway. Indeed, 'The Top' may have come across to fans of 'The Lovecats' as just lacking in good pop tunes. On the otherhand, fans of 'Pornography' will have lamented the glossier production and the definite loss in atmosphere moving forwards from 'Pornography'. In truth, glossy production aside, this album does have more in common with Cure past than it did the pop tunes contained on 'Japanese Whispers'. The tunes on this album don't seem to actually amount to anything, just a disparate collection of songs under the umbrella of the new sound of The Cure. It's a rockier sound in places, the mixing bringing out the guitars and drums better than Cure of before. Robert Smith himself doesn't seem to have changed much, his lyrics and vocals still mention blood and the like, but never mind that. Doesn't matter when 'Shake Dog Shake', the 'blood' song in question is quite thrilling, especially turned up loud on the old record player. I said Mr Smith was much the same. 'The Empty World' is the usual trip across a vocal and lyric that sounds mournful, etc, etc. The song has a few marching type things, no. I haven't checked out what the lyrics are actually about. Oh, 'The Caterpillar'! An excellent tune on an album generally slightly short on excellent tunes. This would have appealed to the new pop-cure fans, no question. It reveals wonderfully well what we can deduce in hindsight, which is 'The Top' is a transitional record working as a bridge between 'Pornography' and 'The Head On The Door'. Later albums would mix the two different strands, but we're getting ahead of ourselves, aren't we? Yes.

'Birdmad Girl' is a favourite of mine from this set. The production is crystal clear, the classic Cure guitar sound is coming out and it seems generally happy. Tunes such as 'The Empty World' are of course a contrast to this, and whilst 'The Top' is no Cure masterpiece, it is, in embronic form.... Sorry, long sentence. It is, in embroynic form, a basis of sorts for almost every Cure album that followed! 'Wailing Wall' is spectacularly dour, but contains an addiction atmosphere of night and dark. 'Dressing Up' opens with a very happy 80s pop melody, some kind of flute thing and, at the end of the day, is called 'Dressing Up' when 'Wailing Wall' is called 'Wailing Wall'. Can you see what i'm getting at here? The Cure were indeed changing, but weren't yet quite where they wanted to be. Still, 'The Top' is a decent Cure album to pick out, a good starting point if you want a starting point that is an utterly middle Cure release in the grand scale of things.

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Well, the transformation is complete. This is easily the most melodic Cure album since 'Three Imaginary Boys'. It also sports the best sound, they've seemingly left their underground roots behind, although, Mr Smith still does his best lyrically. 'Kyoto Song' has a chorus that tells us Mr Robert Smith is "lying on the floor of the night before with a stranger next to me". He then mentions death in a pool and trembling hands. Well, I never! Anyway, this is the album that contains one of my favourite EVER Cure songs. Yes, 'Inbetween Days' for me is the first all-out classic pop song The Cure ever wrote. It's perfect pop song length, eg, no more than 3 minutes. It's got a distinctive introduction. The lyrics contain sad words yet the melody is one of the happiest of earth. I love songs like that! The vocals are swooning and georgeous, the song is perfect. So happy! Other singles from this set? Well, 'Close To Me' has a neat shuffling rhythm then a childlike melody and works as another fine piece of pop music. 'A Night Like This' is far more downbeat in feel - it goes dark, i'm watching. I'm going to find you even if it takes all night. Yet, melody prevails. A good balance was being found. 'A Baby Screams' contains a relatively speedy tempo for a Cure song. So did 'In Between Days'. The majority of the songs from 'The Top' didn't. 'The Head On The Door' is certainly the most 'poppy' album proper since the debut, no question.

'The Head On The Door' in some ways is the flip-side to 'Pornography', it's literally the other side to The Cure. This is also an album with a uniformity of sound, yet still containing variety. Hence, the exotice sounding guitar that's present throughout 'The Blood', for just one example. We've got a plethora of potential hit songs, as well as the hit songs that are actually present. 'Six Different Ways' contains enough about it, is jaunty enough, to be a hit song, to my mind. 'Push' is joyous. We also have other moments of darkness of course, the closing song 'Sinking' is one of them. It has a delicious extended instrumental introduction, something that was starting to become, and would become, a Cure trademark. Still, overall? Well, this is a good rounded album, a relatively happy pop album for those people who normally don't listen to supposedly happy music. You know, like 'Black Eyed Peas', or something. The Cure make me happy. 'The Black Eyed Peas' make me want to vomit. Scary thing is, i'm not alone in feeling like this. Eg, as well as selling a load of albums in Europe in 1985, The Cure were also making inroads into the American market....

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I often find the word sprawling used when reading reviews or articles about this album. Now, sprawling can be good or bad depending on context. Sprawling can be good, indicate some kind of lengthy, fantastic journey. Variety, and despite one or two mis-steps, the journey proves more than worth all the effort. On the otherhand, sprawling can be used to indicate an artists over-reaching ambition, a projects lack of cohesion or sustained worth. Robert Smith and his revolving door of side-men took a couple of years out before unveiling the yes, sprawling, 'Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me' double set. Is it worth all the effort? Is it so good effort is not even required in order to enjoy it? A confusing answer, effort is most definitely required but that doesn't neccesarily mean the album is sprawling in the latter sense. Not neccesarily. Initial listening just seems so monotonous, a run of songs indistinct from each other. The length of the album meaning you likely give up listening roughly two-thirds of the way through. Effort is required, the album demands repeated listening through the few utter genius pop nuggest sprinkled throughout. Those pop nuggets demand you listen to the rest of the album enough times so you feel you can't possibly radically change your mind about it. Anyhoo, what about said nuggets? Well, i'll start at the top with 'Just Like Heaven'. Later given a radical fuzz-guitar-noise makeover by Dinosaur Jr, 'Just Like Heaven' is just such a dreamy song, possibly even better than 'Inbetween Days', if such a thing is imaginable. The bass ( oh, what a melody! ) and the synths ( oh, how dreamy! ) combine just so well. The lyrics and vocals are so enchanting. The other hit from the album was 'Why Can't I Be You?', another pop nugget to draw you into this deep and wide collection of songs. Extending far downward beneath a surface. More than enough in size or scope or capacity.

And now? The Larch. And Now? Well, not The Larch, rather some quotes from reviews i've found on rateyourmusic, a great little site to check out, by the way. This album can kiss my ass. Hmmm. Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me is arguably the best place to sample their successes and flaws--2 LPs worth of leader Robert Smith's sprawling musical world. That word sprawling! The daunting sprawl of Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me can, particularly on initial listens, obscure some of the cracking songs that the Cure deliver here. Well, yes. That was one of the points I was trying to make, too. As much as I love the Cure, I could not enjoy this as much as I did Disintegration. Most of the songs are just too forgettable except for my favorite, "Just Like Heaven". There you go! Well, we'll get to 'Disintegration' very shortly.

The album opens with the atmospheric and then quite aggressive, largely instrumental, 'The Kiss'. 'Catch' which follows is so sweet, an absolutely lovely Cure song that seems fairly unassuming but that I rate as one of Robert Smith's finest pieces of writing. Love the lyrics and tone of the vocals. Moving into darker territory we reach 'If Only Tonight We Could Sleep', a song quite able to send your arms all cold, you know, that goosebumps moment. Longest tune on the album is 'The Snakepit' and suddenly, you can comprehend why The Cure were making increasing inroads into America. The Cure use their by now trademark lengthy instrumental introduction, but this is glorious. Can't you just imagine them spinning and weaving this stuff out across a huge stadium? Doesn't take a lot of imagination, does it? For the record, 'The Snakepit' actually isn't one of the albums finest moments. After this introduction, it never really goes anywhere. 'Hot Hot Hot' and 'All I Want' raise the temperature, 'The Perfect Girl' is The Cure in pop mode, fully in pop mode and this could have been a hit, to my mind. Right through to the closing 'The Fight', the album constantly surprises with further listens. It rewards. There is actually very little wrong with the record apart from untangible things. Do you reach for 'Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me' very often? I find myself not reaching for it all that often. Even when you've discovered the albums charms, even when you are very familiar with it? It still remains an obstinately difficult record to easily enjoy. That's the nature of the beast. I still find myself giving the album a '9', although it's probably a weak 9. Call it an 8 and three quarters, because it's certainly a step above the already excellent 'Head On The Door'. Oh, before I go, a question. Was this review sprawling enough? I did try.

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We had 'Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me', which moved in all sorts of directions. Albums such as 'Japanese Whispers' and 'The Head On The Door'. We'd experienced a few years of The Cure pursuing different themes - pop songs, stylistic shifts. They never strayed too far away from the black side, for every 'The Lovecats' we also got ourselves a 'Sinking', just as a reminder. Etc and so forth and something of the sort. 'Disintegration' on the otherhand plunged us right back into cohesive Cure mode, an entire album with much the same atmosphere, tone and feel throughout. Of course, there are variations. Of course, but variations rather than diversity. 'Disintegration', much like 'Pornography' or '17 Seconds' isn't really about being diverse. That's not really the point. As such, we move back to Cure songs where the backing tracks, on first glance, all seem to be very similar to each other. One thing that happens here, and you can see 'Pornography' was trying for the same effect, is that the lyrics are really thrown into sharp focus. Apart from subtly differing tempos and moods musically, it's the lyrics that really hold this album together. Having said that, certain Cure musical trademarks, such as the lengthy introductions, are taken to glorious extremes here. Some of these intros take on hypnotic qualities, instrumental introductions you could almost immerse yourself in all day long. Musically then, we get a wash of atmospheric keyboards, one note and one tone guitar playing, a drummer who tries gamely to provide different drum patterns throughout, even though the vast majority of the songs are in more or less the same tempo. Finally, the bass guitar. For certain songs, the bass is playing very much a minor, supporting role. Generally, it's the poppier material, if it can be called such, that gives the opportunity for melodic and wonderfully uplifting bass lines to appear. Yes, uplifting. Shards of light appearing.

We'll talk about the singles. Following the mumbled mentions of cold amidst music that evokes a freezing dark landscape ( 'Plainsong' ), we get a seven and a half minute long pop-song. Well, obviously, 'pop-song' is stretching the point, stretching the format and the term. 'Pictures Of You', I assume the single version was shorter, follows on beautifully from 'Plainsong'. A good two minutes elapse before the vocals arrive. Happily, when they do, the vocals and especially the lyrics, are absolute romance of the best despairing kind. Remembering you standing quiet in the rain. This is exactly what Goths called romance in the 80s, my friends. 'Love Song' follows on from the rumbling bass guitar, movie soundtrack atmosphere of 'Closedown'. We get ourselves a melodic bass line and proper pop supporting Cure keyboards. Mr Smith sounds lost and lonely and is all the more alluring for it. 'Love Song' is a wonderfully arranged song with great little musical flourishes here and there, lovely keyboard touches. When it becomes clear that 'Lullaby' also follows on from a song full of atmosphere musically but little else other than Bob Smith reaching into the depths of darkness, it seems a clear pattern has emerged for the first half of this 'Disintegration' album. It's a formula that works, though. Again, as with other songs here, 'Lullaby' is a wonderfully orchestrated musical track, if that's the right descriptive word to use back there. My favourite song on the album was never released as a single. I first heard it, not via 'Disintegration' but from a live performance. 'Fascination Street' kicked serious butt when performed live. Took me awhile to get into the studio version, but obviously, I have done now. 'Fascination Street' has a two and a bit minute long intro with loud drums and spiralling guitar. When the vocals do arrive, they are suitably sinister and creepy. The bass rumbles on, the keyboard parts provide extra texture. A classic Cure track if ever there was one, although I do know a few Cure fans who really don't like the song at all, silly fellows.

Before I go, i've got to mention the fact, well, a couple of facts actually. One - 'Disintegration' has no weak links in its twelve link song cycle. The closing three tunes, three tunes lasting a sprightly twenty ones minutes, are as full of atmosphere, bleakness, shards of light breaking through and glorious lyrics as the rest of the album. Special note for the lovely little piano bits that pop up throughout 'Homesick'. Two - I absolutely adore the fifteen minutes or so of music that is 'Prayers For Rain' and 'The Same Deep Water As You'. Rightly placed next to each other on the album, almost like a single fifteen minute long suite. Pits of despair! Orchestral sounding sections! The best movie soundtrack ever to a movie that's yet to be made. Although, presumably this would be some kind of underwater movie featuring a broken relationship and some guy going off the rails, walking through rainy streets looking at soggy pictures of his former girlfriend. I don't know what it is, just that 'Disintegration' as a whole really is an album that you can immerse yourself in. It scores over 'Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me' slightly by sheer dint of its cohesion. It loses half a mark out of the ten because the first half is slightly less cohesive than the second, and also the fact, it's entirely possible that 'Disintegration' isn't an album you can just pop on and enjoy. Almost like you have to be prepared for it, not always a bad thing. Not always a good thing either, however. So, two slight niggles, but it's blindingly clear that The Cure were operating at some kind of peak level right about this time in their history.

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'Wish' is structured in a similar fashion to the previous two albums in the most superficial sense, eg, it lasts for an hour plus. 'Disintegration' had a cohesive mood, 'Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me' didn't, but it did seem to envelop you as if it did have a cohesive mood. It took you on a journey. 'Wish' is a more straightforward beast, half the album is a return to the pop of 'Head On The Door', several tracks continue the usual Cure moodiness and darkness, albeit with a different sound. The production here is very 90s, not a trace of that 80s thinness that wasn't just something that happened on Cure records, it was common with a lot of 80s indie/alternative albums. Things changed with recording technology and a lot of artists produced very different sounding albums at the turn of the 90s to anything they had recorded previously. Certain artists embraced the new technology to move in different directions, others retained all their usual traits but used the 'new sound' to polish up their previous sonic template. This was fine for the likes of Cocteau Twins who with 'Heaven Or Las Vegas' married more polished production with arguably their finest set of songs. The Cure don't quite manage such a feat here, although they do produce a fine set of tunes all the same. Expectations perhaps were overly high, certain Cure fans almost lived or died through their Cure albums. 'Wish', it could and has been argued, just doesn't have that air of 'magic' surrounding it that the best Cure albums of the past posessed. It's all being a little picky, if you ask me. It's still a fine album.

'Open' immediately sets out differences, a guitar oriented track whereby 'Disintegration' led more with keyboards. A minute or so instrumental introduction before Bob Smith sings and this is a mighty opening tune. It contains all the required hints at desperation and marries them to a fairly thrilling guitar assault. 'High' and 'Friday I'm In Love' are the main singles here. 'High' following on from 'Open' etches out a strong beginning to the record, a poppy counterpart to the anguish of 'Open'. 'Friday I'm In Love' has almost become a 'Shiny Happy People' for The Cure, the kind of albatross around their neck previous poppy hits such as 'The Lovecats' failed to become, because The Cure weren't quite such a massive commercial proposition back in those days. Also, dare I say it, because 'Friday I'm In Love' isn't anywhere near as endearing as 'The Lovecats' and the like were. Not as cuddly anymore. 'Wendy Time' and 'Doing The Unstuck', particularly the latter, continue in a pop vein. The remainder of the album is taken up with a few guitar oriented songs in a harder hitting rock vein and a few slow ballads. The ballads come off best, for my money. A rock song like 'Cut' lacks distinction, The Cure suddenly sound, well, ordinary. On the flip-side, 'To Wish Impossible Things' is beautifully lonesome, 'Apart' possibly my pick of all the songs on the album, it really tugs at the heart-strings and gets that Cure magic spinning again. 'A Letter To Elise' is a decent mid-tempo pop ballad in the Cure idiom and the album finishes off with the dark rock desperation of 'End'. 'Open' and 'End? Well, they had to really, didn't they?

Deductions? Well, most of the actual songs here are absolutely fine. One or two slight mis-steps, but nothing you'd hang anybody for. A solid album with a few highlights, a few lesser lights and a good solid inbetween. It's just not a particularly interesting album, that's all. Doesn't stop me picking the CD up from time to time and giving it an enjoyable spin, though.

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Four years was too long to stay away if all Robert Smith and fellows were going to offer was an uninspired re-tread of the previous record, with added brit-pop overproduction. 'Wild Mood Swings' is a Cure pop album in every sense of the word, which makes it somewhat strange that the two lead singles were so uninspired. 'The 13th' sounds like every other Cure pop song of a mid-tempo happy nature, rolled into one. 'Mint Car' just sounds so horribly recorded and mixed, which may well be a big part of the problem with the album as a whole. 'Mint Car' is a good example. You can hear guitars, but they are mixed in such a way as to sound almost embarrassed by themselves. The vocals also leave a little to be desired, as the resulting sound leaves the vocals way upfront ahead of the musical backing. It draws attention to deficiencies present in the latter day Robert Smith vocals. We'll move onto better tunes. I like the opening track, it's atmospheric enough and good enough to classify as a decent Cure tune, if not exactly a special one. The Cure seemed to have run out of any new ideas at all, bar making the production all the glossier. A procession of songs follow, one after the other and nothing seems to happen at all. No different textures, no interesting things to grab you. Well, 'Numb' intrigues immediately with acoustic guitar, still horribly mixed, yet acoustic all the same. A measured instrumental introduction to lead into a tired sounding Robert Smith. One of the albums more honest songs, I would wager.

The closing song 'Bare' lasts nearly eight minutes and almost but not quite manages to be beautiful misery. I have a theory that 'Wild Mood Swings' would have been a far better album if it had been naturally miserable instead of unnaturally happy. Maybe that's just me, but I genuinely struggle to find much to recommend about the album outside of the more miserable tunes. The Cure just sound so ordinary everywhere else, to the point of sounding like a weak parody of their former selves, albeit one designed to sell records. The modern production touches such as they are, don't integrate well into the sound. Keyboards no longer organically create the bedrock of Cure songs, they are just superfluous icing on a not particularly tasty cake.

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I must say, following 'Wild Mood Swings', I thought The Cure dead and buried and wasn't expecting them to come back. The pre-release news about 'Bloodflowers' only further confused me. The third part of a now-trilogy with 'Pornography' and 'Distintegration'? Great, I thought, if they can pull it off. Secondly I thought, they'll alienate a good portion of their post 'Disintegration' fanbase who have grown up with 'Wish' and 'Wild Mood Swings', the britpop generation. Once hearing the album, 'Out Of This World' hardly impresses, atmospherics ruined by poor production, a lack of detail and a lack of the layering of instrumentation that made the sound and feel of 'Distintegration' so rich, the lack of simplicity that characterised 'Pornography'. Robert Smith himself invited such comparisions by drawing them in the first place, pre-release. Second tune, 'Watching Me Fall' continues the albums almost complete lack of inviting melody, the guitars swamped and indistinct, the vocals mere tuneless dirge, the lyrics somewhow lacking a certain genuine, convincing quality. As if the entire album is a mere excersize designed to win fans the groups more arty fans. Restore some lost credibility after the mediocre 'Wild Mood Swings'. It doesn't work, what even is this? It sounds like a rock/grunge band in slow motion with an unsuitable singer. I don't hold onto sacred cows, the history of The Cure is and should be irrelevant. Thankfully, the album does contain a couple of highlights, though. Firstly, 'The Last Day Of Summer'. This song sports a proper Cure introduction, genuinely appropriately lost and mournful sounding Robert Smith vocals. The sound of the track still doesn't convince, the keyboards mixed down, the guitars sounding strangely indistinct, although the bass does work here, a classic Cure-type bass-line.

'There Is No If' almost sports a new sound for the group, a largely acoustic based musical backdrop brings the vocals into sharp focus and they dont disappoint as Mr Smith pens an affecting Cure ballad. '39' sees the group acheive an impressive sound for almost the first time on the album, the keyboards and guitars better integrated, the band in epic rock mode, spilling out atmosphere and melody enough to fill a stadium epically and enjoyably. On the otherhand, the title track is atmosphere in search of a tune, 'Maybe Someday' average material given a decent Cure makeover, but still not entirely convincing in the tune and repeat-play department. 'Bloodflowers' is an album almost bereft of genuine quality, an album without a real sense of purpose and lacking entirely in new ideas. Stylistically, it throws the Cure back more than a decade without introducing enough new elements to suggest this is a brave new beginning.

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Robert Smith is typically disgruntled and The Cure have made an album that sounds like a particularly adept Cure cover band in a top studio making a pastiche of 'Wish' with a little 'Disintegration' thrown in. We never expect innovation from The Cure but what worries me more is how little these songs are actually based upon. Cure songs used to be built like houses or in the earlier years built on atmosphere. The songs on this LP don't seem to have any actual foundations, however instantly pleasing the sound may be to long-term Cure fans who have been there and done that. Make no mistake, this is an album for Cure fans with a Cure fan ( Ross Robinson ) as producer, a rare outsider in the studio with Robert Smith and co. So, if 'The Cure' sounds like a parody of The Cure, why still the '6' out of '10' and not a '5' or '4' I hear one person cry? Well, my old fellow, The Cure is an instantly appealing LP to listen to and upon hearing the opening track 'Lost' in particular, it's easy to get carried away and excitied and believe that really, The Cure are well and truly back. Robert Smith gives one of his more passionate vocal performances as the music resembles an enjoyably aggressive dirge behind him. A track that actually does withstand repeated listenings is 'Anniversary'. It's built upon layers but has a beating heart, the little keyboard melody. The vocal melody and lyrics are suitably darkly attractive and The Cure coming out of retirement is worth it if only for songs like this, 'Lost' and the Cure-by-numbers ( but still decent ) single, 'The End Of The World'.

'Us Or Them' opens with a barrage of guitars and 'The Cure' is a guitar heavy album but previous classic Cure relied on bass and keyboards and layered everything. Well, when we got round to 'Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me' and 'Disintegration' at least. These songs are guitar led but don't have the same depth musically as a result. Sure, on a song like 'Us And Them' the bass rumbles away yet the keyboards may as well not be there and since when were The Cure really ever a ROCK band. Surely they were only ever 'indie' or 'alternative' or 'modern rock'? Ultimately this guitar heavy Cure album produced by a metal producer simply gets rather tiresome somewhere shortly into the second half. As for the eleven minute 'The Promise', well, impressive as it sounds, I can still live without it.

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Robert Smith still sings of boys and girls, rather than men and women. Robert Smith will be fifty years old in April, 2009. Isn't about time he grew up? '4:13 Dream' suffers from the same problem all post-wish Cure albums have suffered from - it struggles to find a real reason to actually exist. 'The Only One' mentions the word love 23 times. 'The Only One', 'Freakshow', 'The Perfect Boy' and 'Sleep When I'm Dead' have been released as singles, each one on the 13th day of the month, from May 2008 onwards. A smart promotional idea you might think? Well, it would have been if any of the singles had made any impact outside of the inner circle of dedicated Cure fans. '4:13' was originally supposed to have been a double album, by the way. I'm sorry really that idea wasn't carried through. What we are left with is an album that's largely yet another attempt to pick up from where 'Wish' left off. The return of Porl Thompson has had an effect, his scratchy guitar sound is all over songs such as 'Sleep When I'm Dead', reminding you of classic Cure gone by. Indeed, this song could have come from 'Disintegration', as could album opener, the six-minute 'Underneath The Stars'. Yes, The Cure are merely repeating themselves, but long-term fans will inevitably find much to enjoy in such moments.

None of the four singles make particularly good singles if judging them by past Cure efforts. 'The Only One' is the clearest commercial moment, sounding like a cousin of 'Friday I'm In Love'. The other three singles, really just manage to be decent album tracks. No real reason to exist, I said? Well, the sound of '4:13 Dream' is somewhere between 'Disintegration' and 'Wish' as if Robert Smith has been in stasis for the past twenty years. Why not pursue something, the closing 'It's Over' for example is a stupendous piece of Cure rock music - suddenly they sound more energetic than they have done, well, almost ever. Together with the equally impressive 'Scream' this is a fine way to close an album.

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